Equip UK - People

The MD - Matt Gowar As founder and driving force of Equip Outdoor Technologies Matt juggles the demands of running an expanding business with limited leisure time out on the water. He's responsible for sales in North America and the Pacific rim. matt.gowar@equipuk.com


Design, Sales and Marketing Director - Chris Harding
	As Head of Product, Sales and Marketing Chris has overall responsibility for product development and new range timelines, co-ordinating the efforts of the specialist designers in the team and he's responsible for all European sales. chris.harding@equipuk.com


The Design Team

Helen Roberts With several years outdoor retail experience before switching to a career in design Helen has worked on all the Equip brands specialising on the new Rab women's wear range. She's a keen climber and surfer though freely admits she's not good at either! helen.roberts@equipuk.com	Ben Manwaring Ben comes from a product design background, with his interests being climbing, scrambling, hillwalking and mountain biking he'd wanted to get into the outdoor industry for a while - he's managed it as he's now our equipment designer. ben.manwaring@ equipuk.com	Oliver Nissen Our junior designer Oliver has previously worked for a down clothing company and is in the final stages of completing his MA in Performance Sportswear Design at the University of Derby. He has an active interest in the mountains and is a keen snowboarder. oliver.nissen@equipuk.com

Mat Nalder Mat joins us from New Zealand and he brings with him a wealth of design experience across Rucksacks, Sleeping Bags and Down products. mat.nalder@equipuk.com	Rab Carrington As a guru of technical clothing and sleeping bag design, original founder of the RAB brand and respected climber for 30 years Rab remains an occasional consultant on our range development and detail. Rab is still climbing, harder than ever, and is also a vice president of the British Mountaineering Council.	Pete O'Donovan Pete is a lifelong climber, product designer and original founder of the Podsacs brand. Pete is now a consultant and advisor to us on Podsacs design and splits his time between the climbing areas of the Peak District and Northern Spain. He is also an accomplished climbing photographer, look out for his photos in UK and European climbing magazines.

Garment Technology

Hayley Allsebrook Hayley is our garment technologist and came to Equip after several years in the field of garment technology, Hayley is a valuable part of the Equip design team. hayley.allsebrook@ equipuk.com	Jane Grimshaw Jane joins us from Leeds University where she has already gained a BA (Hons) in Textile Design, an MSc (Merit) in Advanced Clothing & Performance Textiles and is currently completing her PhD into Garment Performance jane.grimshaw@equipuk.com

Sales Manager - Neil McAdie
	Neil is responsible for UK and Eire sales across all brands at Equip, working with a team of 4 sales reps and 4 sales office administrators, mixing time in the office with visits to key accounts throughout the territory. Neil has worked in the outdoor industry since 1990 and also has a strong climbing and mountaineering background in the UK, Europe, the Americas and Himalaya. neil.mcadie@equipuk.com

The Sales Team Trade sales are serviced by a combination of 'area sales managers' and 'internal sales office support staff':
Scotland, Lakes, N Ireland and Eire
Area Sales Manager	Area Sales Manager	Sales Office Contact
Ian Cowie - Area Manager Scotland and the Lakes. Ian tours the Highlands talking about outdoor kit - some people would pay to do that yet we pay him! Easy life! With wide ranging industry experience and a strong ski background Ian works across all of our brands. ian.cowie@equipuk.com	Paul Innes Paul is our sales agent for both Eire and Northern Ireland across all of the Equip brands. Paul has a strong background in technical equipment sales at both retail and supply level and brings great experience to our team. Paul remains a committed rock climber, dodging the rain in Ireland! paul.innes@equipuk.com	Dan Thompson Dan Thompson works in our sales office looking after all of Ian’s accounts (Scotland, Lakes, NE) and Paul’s area (Northern Ireland and Eire). Dan joins us from a background in the sharp end of retail and could lay claim to be the fittest member of our team with a 100km round trip cycle across the Peak District to work each day. Seen here competing in this years Fred Whitton race in the Lake District. dan.thompson@equipuk.com
North Wales, Northern England and the Midlands
Area Sales Manager	Sales Office Contact
Chris Vanderhoven - Area Manager for the North of England, North Wales and the Midlands, Chris is an all round outdoors guy, he climbs, mountain bikes and snowboards and apparently loves llamas! chris.vanderhoven@ equipuk.com	Declan McGing Dec looks after Chris' accounts. In his spare time he admits to being quite lazy, watching films and reading books but after getting a mountain bike last year he's trying to change this. declan.mcging@equipuk.com
Southern England and South Wales
Area Sales Manager	Sales Office Contact
Matt Bengey After learning his craft in specialist outdoor retail Matt is now our Area Manager in the South of England and South Wales. Matt loves to drive and talk about gear, an ideal combination! As a keen climber he can often be found on the great trad routes in the Bristol and SW area with trips to Yosemite and Europe when possible. matt.bengey@equipuk.com	Dan Winter Another recruit from a specialist outdoor retail background Dan provides the sales office support for Matt’s area accounts, and also administers all the export sales for EU countries. When not at work Dan can be found mountain biking in our local Peak District or falling off a Gritstone crag! dan.winter@equipuk.com

International Sales
Sales Office Contact	Sales Agent Norway	Sales Agent Norway
Jonathan Morgan Jon processes all export sales from our head office and brings to Equip a wealth of experience after working in the outdoor retail trade and working as a climbing/skiing/hiking guide for the world Scout centre in Switzerland. He is an all round climber, Mountain marathon competitor and skier. He looks after all of our export customers. jonathan.morgan@ equipuk.com	Bjørn Kruse Giant Norwegian ski-god and sales agent for RAB, outdoordesigns and Handy Heros in Norway. Bjørn loves steep couloirs, outdoordesigns gloves and beautiful women, but not necessarily in that order! info@topptur.com	Christian Evensen Christian is a skier, climber, hunter and just enjoys life to the full. info@topptur.com
Sales Agent Switzerland	Sales Agent Switzerland	Sales Agent Benelux
Milos Fryta Sales Agent in Switzerland for the Rab brand freetimex@bluewin.ch	Hermann Blaser Sales Agent in Switzerland for the outdoordesigns and Handy Heros brands hermann.blaser@ sherpaoutdoor.ch	Rob Fröberg Rob is our sales agent for RAB, outdoordesigns and Handy Heros in Benelux. Originally with a strong climbing background Rob now sticks to hiking, mountain biking, skiing and speedskating. info@outware.nl
Sales Agent France	Sales Agent Italy	Sales Agent Germany
Jonathan Caffyn Jonathan is our contact for all French sales. info@toprock.fr	Pierluigi Marengon Pierluigi is our contact for all Italian sales. pierluigi@vikingnordpool.com	Dirk Reinholz The German agent for Equip, like many in the outdoor trade, Dirk went from hobby to profession. In the little bits of spare time he can find he likes running, hiking, biking and skiing but also loves a good match of tennis or beach volleyball. info@cleanwood.eu
Sales Agent Quebec, Canada	Sales Agent USA
Antoine Simpson Antoine has been working in the outdoor industry for the past 10 years. During the winter, he spends most of his time back country skiing and during the summer he's mountain biking, road biking, hiking, surfing and camping, it's amazing he has any time left to work! sportrobson@rogers.com	Matt Gowar Matt is the contact for all sales in the USA. matt.gowar@equipuk.com

Marketing

Nikki Skinner Marketing Manager Nikki has worked in the outdoor industry for a while and is a self confessed gear freak! She is happiest outdoors whether cycling, running, climbing, mountaineering or having a coffee and reading the papers. nikki.skinner@equipuk.com	Georgina Reed George is our graphic designer, working on packaging, web sites and catalogues, between trips putting our walking products to good use on the local hills of the Peak District. georgina.reed@equipuk.com

Finance

Rose Moore Rose has overall responsibility for daily monitoring of our financial systems. When not at work Rose is our top golfer and often found out on the fairway...or bunker! As she pays all of our wages she's a really, really top woman! rose.moore@equipuk.com	Beth Edwards Beth runs our sales ledger function in the UK. When she's not on the 'phone encouraging our customers to settle their accounts she can be found developing her position as our number one party animal. beth.edwards@equipuk.com	Hallam Catton Hallam continues the tradition of being a party animal and a member of the accounts department. Finding a picture of him without a beer in hand was quite an achievement! hallam.catton@equipuk.com

I.T.
	James Philpot James the techie, mends the computers when they go wrong! He is responsible for maintaining the computer network and telephone system. james.philpot@equipuk.com

Buying

Steve Bridges Steve is the company buyer, he's responsible for ...buying! He can often be found climbing the walls! steve.bridges@ equipuk.com	Jonathan (LJ)Powell Buying aministrator LJ is an experienced climber, mountain biker and kayaker, oh and you don't want to upset him...he's a black belt first dan in Karate!! jonathan.powell@ equipuk.com

Operations

Lee Bridges Operations Manager Lee has full responsibility for the warehouse and factory. He cruelly extracts every last gram of effort out of our experienced staff members ensuring consistently high quality. lee.bridges@equipuk.com	Mark Wilson Customer services manager Mark tackles any returns across all of the equip brands. After many years working on the RAB fabric cutting tables and using the gear for biking and running events Mark is well qualified to answer your questions across the whole RAB range. mark.wilson@equipuk.com

Factory With a long established and respected reputation our UK factory is a centre of excellence on specialist down production, housing cutting, sewing, down filling and a quality assurance facility. This enables us to produce short run specialist expedition clothing and continue to hand fill all RAB down sleeping bags on our own premises in Derbyshire.
Rachel Brown	Karen Topham	Jackie Bramhall
Rachel, Karen and Jackie work in the Rab factory on expedition clothing, repairs and samples.
Dave Cunningham	Lester Allcock
The lads are our experienced down fillers ensuring consistent and controlled filling of all down sleeping bags at our factory in Derbyshire.

Warehouse

Ian Worley Warehouse supervisor Ian takes part in a variety of sporty activities, although skittles, darts and pool don’t usually require the use of the RAB range of equipment!	David Naylor David is a valuable member of the warehouse team, even if he does support Notts County!	Richard Webster Richard is a Nottingham Forest supporter but so far we've managed to keep him and David apart!

Neil Sims Neil is yet another football fan, as a supporter of Derby County it's as though each member of the warehouse has to support a different team!	Richard Palmer You guessed it, another football fan...this time it's Man United but Richard also likes a game of golf.